The present invention relates to television audience measuring systems and, more particularly, to audience measuring systems for personal video recording systems.
Video and audio media, such as television programs, pay-per-view programs, near-video-on-demand (NVOD) programs, video-on-demand (VOD) programs, music, promotional material, or other types of media, are typically distributed to viewers over wired and wireless networks. Currently, audience measuring systems measure the audience sizes based only on the media that is being watched or recorded as it is broadcast.
However, viewers and listeners of such media typically record such media on videocassettes, audiocassettes, and other storage media. More recently, products have been developed that allow users to manage their viewing experiences and record media with unprecedented flexibility. Personal video recorders (PVRs), such as those provided by TIVO™ and REPLAY™, record programs on hard-disk drives or other digital storage devices. Users can schedule programs for recording and play them back at a later time. These systems also record what users are watching in real-time, allowing the users to pause real-time programs when, for example, the user must leave the room. Users may resume their viewing upon returning, where they left off, and may even fast forward through commercials until they reach the point at which the program is currently provided. Users may also rewind programs. User may also watch or listen to some media while simultaneously recording another.
With the advent of these and other new technologies, traditional methods for audience measuring are no longer optimal for measuring audience sizes because they measure the audience size for only what is watched or recorded as it is broadcast. Such approaches do not account for future viewings of programs from personal recordings. In addition, it may be desirable to provide audience measurements to users to guide them in selecting media.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide systems and methods for measuring audience sizes and for providing audience size information to users.